Sixteen-year-old Cynthia Molina got out of bed before sunrise on Tuesday and was rewarded with the first place in line for the opening of Kim Kardashian West’s new KKW Beauty and Fragrance pop-up store at South Coast Plaza.

That meant that Molina, her three friends and the dad who drove, were the first customers to walk into the minimalist store — that will only be open through February — so the Santa Ana teen was able to hand-deliver a bouquet of flowers she’d brought for Kardashian West and get an autograph and selfie in return.

“I was a fan of hers for eight years,” said Cynthia, who came with friend Ayleah Ponce, 16, and Ponce’s cousins Alexa Miramontes, 13, and Daniela Miramontes, 22. “It’s the first time she came to our city so I just thought I wanted to meet her.”

Molina was wearing a deep mauve lipstick called Soul Sister, part of the KKW Beauty x Kylie Cosmetics collaboration between sisters Kardashian West and Kylie Jenner. And many of those in the line that reached at least 300 people long by the time the store opened also acknowledged wearing cosmetics or fragrances they’d already bought from KKW Beauty online, with many others seeming to mirror Kardashian West’s signature look — a smoky eye, a peachy nude blush, and long, glossy black hairstyles.

Kim Kardashian West takes a selfie with Christine Castro during the opening of Kardashian West’s pop-up store at South Coast Plaza in Costa Mesa, CA on Tuesday, December 4, 2018. (Photo by Paul Bersebach, Orange County Register/SCNG)

Kim Kardashian West records her fans at the opening of her pop-up store, KKW, at South Coast Plaza in Costa Mesa, CA on Tuesday, December 4, 2018. (Photo by Paul Bersebach, Orange County Register/SCNG)

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A general view of atmosphere at KKW Beauty Pop-Up at South Coast Plaza on December 4, 2018 in Costa Mesa, California. (Photo by Stefanie Keenan/Getty Images for KKW Beauty)

Kim Kardashian West greets her fans at the opening of her pop-up store, KKW, at South Coast Plaza in Costa Mesa, CA on Tuesday, December 4, 2018. (Photo by Paul Bersebach, Orange County Register/SCNG)

Shoppers wait for the opening of KKW and an appearance by Kim Kardashian West at the opening of her pop-up store at South Coast Plaza in Costa Mesa, CA on Tuesday, December 4, 2018. (Photo by Paul Bersebach, Orange County Register/SCNG)

A general view of atmosphere at KKW Beauty Pop-Up at South Coast Plaza on December 4, 2018 in Costa Mesa, California. (Photo by Stefanie Keenan/Getty Images for KKW Beauty)

Kim Kardashian West signs an autograph for Cynthia Molina at the opening of Kardashian West’s pop-up store, KKW, at South Coast Plaza in Costa Mesa, CA on Tuesday, December 4, 2018. (Photo by Paul Bersebach, Orange County Register/SCNG)

A general view of atmosphere at KKW Beauty Pop-Up at South Coast Plaza on December 4, 2018 in Costa Mesa, California. (Photo by Stefanie Keenan/Getty Images for KKW Beauty)

Callie Ferencik and Kelsey Ramirez, from left, wait in line for the opening of Kim Kardashian West’s pop-up store, KKW, at South Coast Plaza in Costa Mesa, CA on Tuesday, December 4, 2018. (Photo by Paul Bersebach, Orange County Register/SCNG)

Kim Kardashian West takes a selfie with Kimberly Nguyen at the opening of Kardashian West’s pop-up store, KKW, at South Coast Plaza in Costa Mesa, CA on Tuesday, December 4, 2018. (Photo by Paul Bersebach, Orange County Register/SCNG)

Fans of Kim Kardashian West wait in line for the opening of her pop-up store, KKW, at South Coast Plaza in Costa Mesa, CA on Tuesday, December 4, 2018. (Photo by Paul Bersebach, Orange County Register/SCNG)

A general view of atmosphere at KKW Beauty Pop-Up at South Coast Plaza on December 4, 2018 in Costa Mesa, California. (Photo by Stefanie Keenan/Getty Images for KKW Beauty)

Kim Kardashian West attends the KKW Beauty Pop-Up at South Coast Plaza on December 4, 2018 in Costa Mesa, California. (Photo by Stefanie Keenan/Getty Images for KKW Beauty)

A general view of atmosphere at KKW Beauty Pop-Up at South Coast Plaza on December 4, 2018 in Costa Mesa, California. (Photo by Stefanie Keenan/Getty Images for KKW Beauty)

A general view of atmosphere at KKW Beauty Pop-Up at South Coast Plaza on December 4, 2018 in Costa Mesa, California. (Photo by Stefanie Keenan/Getty Images for KKW Beauty)

A general view of atmosphere at KKW Beauty Pop-Up at South Coast Plaza on December 4, 2018 in Costa Mesa, California. (Photo by Stefanie Keenan/Getty Images for KKW Beauty)

Kim Kardashian West records her fans at the opening of her pop-up store, KKW, at South Coast Plaza in Costa Mesa, CA on Tuesday, December 4, 2018. (Photo by Paul Bersebach, Orange County Register/SCNG)

Kardashian West perched on a curvy sofa inside the store for an interview before the doors opened on Tuesday, wearing a pinstriped suit with no shirt beneath her single-buttoned jacket and a pair of strappy stiletto heels. She described how the beauty and fragrance line she’d launched in June 2017 had done so well as an online business that this next step, the second such pop-up store, seemed a natural move.

“I’ve always from the start wanted to be in retail,” she said. “Being online was a fun challenge to experiment with.”

Despite huge sales online, cosmetics and fragrances are the kinds of products people want to test before they buy, so she said she wanted to give people a chance to hold it in their hands and try it out before they make a purchase.

“Imagine selling fragrance without anyone (able to) test it or smell it before,” Kardashian West said. “I always dreamed of having it in-store so people can smell, can color-match their concealers, foundations, contours, all of that kind of stuff.”

But this isn’t your typical beauty store with bright lights and shelves crammed with thousands of individual products. Kardashian West said even with – or perhaps because of — its limited three-month run, she wanted it to be as much an experience as a shop.

“A huge part of my brand has always been Instagram and social media, having Instagram-able moments,” she said. “I knew from the start that with every pop-up I opened I wanted that feel.

“When I would go to malls all the time, we would have our parents drop us off and hang out,” Kardashian West said. “We would never go into stores and take pictures, but I can just imagine that if I was 14 and that’s what I was doing I would want a fun experience as well.”

You enter the KKW Beauty pop-up like you are entering the line for a theme park attraction, following a path that curves between iridescent over-sized crystals that jut from the floor, and down a carpeted walkway between twin rows of six large glass columns, each filled with swirling liquid in the rich hues of her Flashing Lights cosmetic collection. Turn a corner and a large cutout in the wall in the curvaceous silhouette of Kardashian West’s figure frames a shelf on which three different KKW Body fragrance bottles in the same shape are displayed.

“When I start to design the store, I do a lot of work on my computer in bed just before I fall asleep,” Kardashian West said. “So I was on my computer and my husband’s like, ‘Wait a minute, why don’t you just use my whole team that does my concerts and does my stage tours, and get them to fully design and light your store.’”

“He’s so gracious and gives me so many ideas,” Kardashian West says, never once actually naming her husband, which of course you can do when you’re married to Kanye West and are therefore half of one of the most famous couples in the world. “It’s usually I’ll present an idea and then, ‘Oh, no no’ — ripped up — ‘We’re starting from scratch, we’re going to even have to push the time a little bit; you need to take time.’

“He definitely gives me all his resources and is so helpful, and I am so grateful.”

She’s the boss, though, so when it comes to picking the right shade of nude for the walls of the pop-up store; that was her call: “If you saw the swatches of nude that I had to go through to pick the right one,” Kardashian West says. “It is so hard, if there are like 50 shades of nude, to find the perfect nude.”

And she’s also hands-on with the product, from colors and conception to the packaging and advertising campaigns: “The Glam Bible, I wanted something that you opened, like a physical book,” she said of one of the new holiday season offerings at the pop-up store. “You open it and instead of pages, it’s all makeup. That’s for someone who wants to buy a gift for someone but doesn’t know what to give them.”

Surely, some of those in line outside KKW Beauty on Tuesday snapped up the Glam Bible or a new limited-edition collection of mini-fragrances or anything really just to know that they were in the presence of the insanely famous Kardashian West and her store for a moment or two.

Breana Valdez, 21, and Raul Perez, 25, both of Santa Ana, were near the front of the line. Valdez was there to check out the cosmetics; Perez was there for the celebrity.

“They’re always changing, and they keep up with what’s trending,” Valdez said of the reason she’s a fan of the Kardashian clan and all their many endeavors.

“And it doesn’t hurt that they’re all very pretty,” Perez said.

Kelsey Ramirez of Foothill Ranch and Callie Ferencik of Laguna Niguel, both 18, came to check out the reality TV legend whose family series, “Keeping Up With The Kardashians,” they’ve grown up watching.

“I’m obsessed with them,” said Ramirez, who spritzed a bit of the Kimoji Hearts fragrance that KKW Beauty released for Valentine’s Day this year. “I’ve watched them for so long that I feel like I’m so invested in their lives. I feel like I know them, if that makes sense.”

That actually doesn’t entirely make sense to Ferencik — she admitted she’s a bit more of a casual fan — but her KKW Beauty contour stick had just run out, and it was an event and an opportunity to buy a new one, so she was down for the adventure, too.

Megan Lane, 16, of Long Beach got up in the dark as Molina had, and after her mom dropped her at the mall waited by herself, eventually striking up conversations with her line mates.

“I’m like a super fan,” said Lane, who wore the Kimoji Peach fragrance for the big day. “I’ve been watching them since before I can remember.

“I say this every day in my house,” she said. “Before I die I want to meet a Kardashian. So hopefully today my dreams come true: I get to meet Kim Kardashian or at least be in the same room as her.”

Peter Larsen has been the Pop Culture Reporter for the Orange County Register since 2004, finally achieving the neat trick of getting paid to report and write about the stuff he's obsessed about pretty much all his life. He regularly covers the Oscars and the Emmys, goes to Comic-Con and Coachella, reviews pop music, and conducts interviews with authors and actors, musicians and directors, a little of this and a whole lot of that. He grew up, in order, in California, Arkansas, Kentucky and Oregon. Graduated from Lewis and Clark College in Portland, Ore. with degrees in English and Communications. Earned a master's degree at the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University. Earned his first newspaper paycheck at the Belleville (Ill.) News-Democrat, fled the Midwest for Los Angeles Daily News and finally ended up at the Orange County Register. He's taught one or two classes a semester in the journalism and mass communications department at Cal State Long Beach since 2006. Somehow managed to get a lovely lady to marry him, and with her have two daughters. And a dog named Buddy. Never forget the dog.